SAN FRANCISCO—As a working lighting
designer, the most common question I hear
is, “Can we do this with LEDs?” For lighting
today’s news sets, talk shows and other
types of studio sets, the question might be
better put as, “Do LEDs make sense for this
project and/or studio?”

The term LED is certainly one of the hot
buzz words at any lighting event or trade
show, but are they really the right tool for
every job?

LED PROS AND CONS
There are many positive attributes to a
high-quality LED lighting fixture (such as
the Kino Flo Celeb) including long lamp
life, low-power consumption, good color
rendering, DMX control, optional colorchanging
fixtures, and more. However,
there can also be some noteworthy drawbacks
to many of the LED fixtures on the
market today, such as low output, poor
color rendering, uneven beam spread, and
a lack of true soft light quality from an
LED “soft light.” Perhaps more importantly,
the cost of most quality LED fixtures can
be quite high, and once the cost of an all-
LED studio is considered, often the idea is
thrown out.

I recently worked on a job involving
the lighting of a news talk show set and it
brought out many of the confusing issues
surrounding the use of LED lights for studio
work. The client had ordered a dozen
or more 1×1 LED fixtures as
part of their “green” effort in
the news studio. Although the
light from a 1×1 LED source is
softer than from a Fresnel spot
source, it’s far from true soft
light—especially at a distance
of eight to 12 feet. I’ve found
that the Kino Flo Celeb is one
of the few LED instruments that
generates a true soft light. Most
other LED panel sources need
to be diffused in order to cast
a more pleasing light on the talent.

Additionally, many news directors like
the flexibility of having the talent look at
several different camera positions, which
can lead to unattractive shadows from
smaller sources. This is exactly what happened
with my client on this job, so I opted
to change out the main light sources
(the 1×1 LEDs) and use larger fluorescent
fixtures—Kino Flo ParaZips—as my primary
illumination sources for the set. The soft
wrap of light from the ParaZips created a
beautiful look on the talent and provided
the flexibility of multiple camera angles
without the worry of difficult shadows.
The 1×1’s were then relegated to serve as
small fill light sources throughout the set.

Another common misconception
about LED lighting today centers on the
lumens per dollar cost factor. With all
factors considered, in most of my studio
work, I still find that the high output and
light quality from fixtures such as the
Kino Flo 4-banks, ParaZips and ParaBeams
are a much better choice for lighting the
talent on a studio set. The softer light, low
power consumption and long lamp life of
a quality fluorescent fixture make such
Kino Flo instruments an excellent longterm
investment for studio operations.

Bill Holshevnikoff is a San Franciscobased
DP/lighting designer. He has been
lighting studio sets and location productions
around the globe for the past 30
years. He may be contacted at bholshev@comcast.net.